Enchanted Revenge (5 page)

The hallway we walked down was fairly normal. Wooden walls. Wall sconces in the shape of flowers that held candles. A carpet of grass and leaves above my head.

Okay, so maybe
not
so normal.

We passed a closed door on the right, and then one on the left, before making it to the opening that led to the kitchen. The kitchen was much like the rest of the tree house. Green and brown. Alec opened a drawer in the cabinet and pulled out a box of matches. He must have been here often to know exactly where to go for them. He struck one, and lit several of the candles around the room.

“We don’t have electricity here.” Makes sense to have candles everywhere- except that we stood in the center of a freaking
wooden
tree.

His square jaw was tight, his high cheekbones looked sharper, and his eyebrows drawn down into an almost-frown. His eyes focused, the happiness gone from them.

I walked up to the table and pulled out a chair, thankful for the chance to finally rest my feet. Though the chair was all wooden, it was comfortable, as if there was a thick cushion atop the wood. So weird. But
so
nice. My feet sang halleluiah.

As I sat, I watched him finish lighting the candles. Then he went to a door, opened it and pulled out some bags. He placed the bags in the center of the table, and then went to a different cabinet and pulled out a jug of something liquid. At another cabinet he pulled out some cups, and then came and sat at the table directly in front of me.

“Drink this,” he said, after pouring some of the blue liquid into a cup and handing it to me.

I looked at the strange cup. It was beautiful, of course, just like everything else here, but it was weird. It almost looked like a large drop of water. It must have been glass, but it wasn’t exactly see through. Still, the shape was unlike any cup I had seen before.

I pulled the gorgeous glass to my lips and drank greedily. I hadn’t realized how thirsty I was until I saw him pouring it out. The taste was sweet and tart at the same time, but not too much. Almost like lemonade, but without the lemon flavor. It was to die for.

To. Die. For…

I took the cup from my mouth and looked at him accusingly. My fingers went to cover my mouth as I realized what I just did. I drank in the fairy world. All the tales say you can’t do that or something bad would happen. You could die. Or be stuck here forever. Or fall under the control of another. Or… anything.

“Oh my gosh,” I breathed.

“What?” he asked, clearly confused and upset by my reaction. He tasted the liquid and shook his head and looked deeper into my eyes. “What happened? Are you okay? It tastes fine to me.”

“I drank it,” I said. My stomach grew furious with me, rumbling around and threatening to expel what I had just put in it. “How could you?”

“Aren’t you thirsty?” he asked, still confused.

“Yeah, but…I just drank a fairy drink in the fairy world. Doesn’t that mean something?”

He paused. Blinked once. Then the corners of his lips lifted up before he bellowed out a hearty laugh. The laugh continued. At first I was angry at him, not only for tricking me and probably poisoning me, but also for laughing at me.

Except he just kept laughing, and then, for a reason I could never explain, I laughed too. Maybe his laugh was too funny I had to laugh at it. Or maybe I was so exhausted I was delirious. We just laughed together until my eyes watered. I even kept laughing when my tears turned to sobs.

But when the tears began to flow even more freely, he stopped laughing, got up and left me alone to my grief. I pictured my parents. They were from this strange place. Had seen these woods before. They may have even lived in a tree like this. Probably not, since they were air fairies. Why did they never tell me? Why didn’t they explain that there was danger? Why didn’t they explain to me who I was, and where I was from? Maybe then I wouldn’t have felt so out of place. Maybe I would’ve understood.

Oh geez, who was I kidding? What was I even doing? Alec was right, I had no way to avenge my parents. I just had nothing else to live for. Nowhere to go. No home. No family. Not even any friends. I just wanted the last two days to go away. Man, to think that only two days had past. Two days ago they were alive and I was complaining about a stupid broken phone. Two days ago I wasn’t alone. Two days ago I had a home and family.

I miss you, Mom. I miss you so much, Daddy
.

I wasn’t sure if I was saying it out loud between sobs, or merely in my head. And really, it didn’t matter. Even if I was poisoned, who cared? And if I was stuck here forever, it would be okay, as long as the bastards who took my parents from me were here and I could still get to them.

Alec came back in once the tears ebbed, and I was zoned out, just staring at a random spot on the wall. He didn’t speak, and I was thankful for that. No questions. No accusations. And even more than that, I was thankful that it wasn’t an awkward silence. It was just a normal, regular silence.

He refilled my drink and took out lumps of stuff from the bags, placing them in front of me on the table. No plate or napkin.

I drank, because it tasted good and I really was thirsty. And whatever harm it would cause was already done. Then I picked up the four inch lump of blackish stuff in front of me. It was soft to the touch, softer than it looked, considering it looked like a glob of tar. I lifted it to my mouth, and before I could even take a bite, I smelled the strong, sweet aroma that oozed from it.

I placed some of it in my mouth and bit down, the juice from inside it spilled over the corners of my lips and down to my chin.

“Cheslins are very juicy,” he said, finally breaking the silence. “But they can last many years after being picked. They are plentiful here in Ardennes.” I nodded, wiping the juice away with the back of my hand. I guess the black tar glob I was eating was a cheslin.

I ate four more before I felt full.

Later we sat on the couch, which wasn’t green or brown. Probably the only thing in the whole tree that wasn’t. It was a deep burgundy, almost purple. And it was thick, soft and comfortable. Heaven. My feet loved this couch and the reprieve it offered.

Alec had lit a fire in the fireplace, and who knew how the smoke got out or where it went, or how the entire tree didn’t catch fire. But I was thankful for it. As the sun set, it grew colder outside, and without electricity and heating, the rooms grew colder as well. Anyway, fires were just comforting altogether. They offered warmth and security, like a false blanket of safety.

“It’s only a myth,” he said, after we had been sitting in silence for quite a while. His statement caught me off guard, since I had been deep in thought. I was thinking about my parents and about this place. About how everything had changed so quickly. About how strange it was that I was sitting in a tree that looked like a house. So, when he said it, I had no idea what he was talking about.

“What?”

“About eating or drinking. It took me a while to figure out what you were thinking and why you were acting like I had poisoned you. You should have seen your face. It was like a betrayal, like you couldn’t believe I would do something so terrible. And I couldn’t figure out why.” He chuckled, and shook his head slightly, which caused his hair to whoosh around and drift over his eyes. “We need to eat too.”

I looked over at him and didn’t really know what to say. No wonder he had looked so confused.

“I mean, if you were a human, you might have to be more careful. There
are
foods and drinks that could cause issues with a human metabolism, but you are not human. You are Fae. So you have nothing to worry about.”

“Oh,” was the only thing I could think to say. I wasn’t human, was I? How strange to think. I mean, I guess I knew that now. But it still didn’t feel right. I’d always been human. And until a few days ago, I didn’t believe in anything other than humans. I didn’t even believe in aliens, even though I loved me some juicy
Luxen
aliens and my fav book boyfriend, Daemon.

Then it grew quiet again between us. Only the crackling of the fire and the flickering of the flames remained.

“It still seems so unreal to me,” I began, mostly just because I wanted to think out loud. “All of this. I mean, I’m sitting in a tree right now, with a freaking fairy.” It sounded harsher than I meant it to, but he didn’t seem to take offense. He just listened to me.

“My parents are dead,” I said finally. I took a deep breath, trying to loosen the tightness in my chest and the lump in my throat. He only nodded but continued to look into my eyes.

In that moment we shared a togetherness. A mutual feeling of loss. Whatever had happened in this place or to the people who lived here had left a lasting grief with him. I could see it clearly in his eyes, in that moment. We both had felt loss. We both
still
felt loss.

“But you’re doing something about it. We cannot bring them back, they have moved on to the Outer Realm. But here, now, you are doing something.”

This time I nodded. Until I thought better of it. What was I doing? Nothing. Traipsing around this fairy world trying to find the bad guys. But then what? What could I really do? I had no skills. I had no weapons. I didn’t even have magic, and I was pretty sure those murderers had magic.

“How do you kill a fairy?”

He turned toward me so fast I thought it might break his neck. His eyes had grown wide with shock and his mouth had opened just slightly. Before he questioned me, I decided to continue. “I need to know. I have to know what to do when we find them.”

He nodded, the shock stripped from his face as he understood my initial question. “Fae are not immortal. We have talked about this before. We live much longer than humans, and age much slower, but we can be killed.” I nodded. “Magic can kill a Fae, as can a wound through the heart with any Fae Blade. And then beheading.” As he said that last word, his voice grew quiet, as if he thought I would break down again if he said it any louder.

But I wouldn’t. I was done crying. I would fix this.

“What is a Fae Blade?” It sounded familiar, like I had heard him say it once before.

“A Fae Blade is a piece of steel infused with magic. Each Fae has a unique magic. Pixie blades are some of the most dangerous, and are infused with fire. They can even cause a fire to manifest when used. The most dangerous of Fae Blades are when all four Fae infuse it with magic.”

He stood and withdrew a sword from his side. It was the same sword he had taken out back at my house, when he had vowed to help me. He lay it across his lap, the pointed side away from me. The hilt was so close it almost touched my knee.

“The person who uses a Fae Blade can wield the most magic from it if he owns the same magic.” As he said it, he caressed the sword, as if it was more to him than just a common weapon. “A Sylph blade is stronger when used by a Sylph, just as a Pixie blade is best used by a Pixie.”

When he looked up at me, finally tearing his eyes from his own blade, I nodded at him. “When a blade is willingly passed down through generations, it gets stronger, gaining strength from each Fae who used it.” Then he looked back down at his sword. It was so beautiful. The hilt looked like pure gold, and had a series of symbols engraved into it. The blade shimmered in the firelight, and flashed the etchings on it clearly. I had no idea what they meant, but they were stunning to look at.

“This sword was my father’s, his father’s before him, and his father’s before him. I believe I’m the seventh generation Sylph to wield it.” He was murmuring, almost as if he had forgotten I was there. He grew quiet for a minute, as if he was remembering something from his past. “This blade was first created for a Royal Guard sworn to protect the King and Queen. It is more than 8000 years old. I am honored to wield it.”

His voice was reverent and full of conviction. I could only imagine what kind of shoes he was expected to fill, how much pressure he must have had put on himself to live up to using a sword of that importance.

“The sword you carry within the abscondita is a very powerful Fae Blade. Probably more than 20,000 years old, infused with all four magics, and has the most intricate magic etched into it that I have ever seen in a blade. When you turn seventeen and can wield it, it will prove a very effective weapon for you. It was your father’s, and thus now has some of his magic within it.”  I couldn’t even lift my father’s sword off the floor, but if it had some of him in it, I was glad to have it.

“Thank you for bringing it,” I told him. I hadn’t really appreciated it before, not like I did now.

“You’re welcome.”

I took a deep breath, drawing up the plans in my head as I stared back into the fire. We would leave here in the morning and set out for, who knows where. Wherever those murderers went. I had exactly five weeks until my birthday. In reality I hoped we would find them before then, but if it took that long, at least I would be able to do something once we found them.

“You need to teach me how to use a sword.”